io9.com captured a recent press release naming Vincenzo Natali as the director of an upcoming production of William Gibson’s Neuromancer. I’m not one to say a book is unfilmable, but as a big fan of the seminal classic, good luck to Natali. He’s gonna need it. Sci-fi adaptations have a poor track record, c.f. Dune and Watchmen. Not to mention the results from adapting Gibson’s own Johnny Mnemonic and New Rose Hotel.
On the plus side, Natali seems to have a distinctive style and vision, having directed Cube and the recent Splice. Natali also did the story boards for Johnny Mnemonic, so presumably he’s familiar with Gibson’s work and well aware of what went wrong with that film.
Now that parts of the cyberpunk ethic have permeated popular culture, and we have other technology aesthetics emerging from the Web, gaming, and mobile telephony, the time might be ripe for a great Neuromancer film.
P. S. A better place to begin a a movie based on Gibson’s work might be the short story Burning Chrome. There’s enough story and style to form the core of a screenplay, but also a lot left unsaid and unexplored, leaving a director with plenty of room to work.